


To Ride the Disheveled Tide

by estelraca



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Fae & Fairies, Folklore, Linguistics, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:20:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28158192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/estelraca/pseuds/estelraca
Summary: When Combeferre and Courfeyrac come to a small out-of-the-way town to do linguistic and folklore research, Combeferre doesn't intend to attract the attention of the local fae.  He's not exactly upset about this state of events, though.
Relationships: Combeferre/Jean Prouvaire
Comments: 11
Kudos: 21
Collections: Les Mis Holiday Exchange (2020)





	To Ride the Disheveled Tide

**Author's Note:**

  * For [boom_goes_the_canon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/boom_goes_the_canon/gifts).



> I absolutely loved this prompt, and hope that you enjoy my attempt at fulfilling it.

_To Ride the Disheveled Tide_

Combeferre looks out over the rolling green hills, his eyes snagging on the protrusions of gray rock that break through here and there. This isn't a gentle land, or a welcoming one. That's part of why these people were able to hang on to a bit more of their traditional culture and language—part of why this area makes an ideal study site for the linguistic questions he has.

The fact that it's also beautiful, in a rough, harsh way, just makes the job more appealing.

“What are you doing out here?” Courfeyrac rubs his hands together, acting for all the world like it's below freezing when really it's just a bit nippy.

“Surveying our landscape.” Combeferre doesn't bother to gesture. He knows Courfeyrac well enough to know the man will be taking in the beauty in his own way. “A people can be known by their land, and vice versa.”

“It's not the land that we're interested in.” Courfeyrac shivers, watching the sun sink behind the horizon with something that looks remarkably like concern. “It's the people, their ways of speaking and the stories they tell. Stories like how dangerous it is to be out past dark.”

Combeferre can't help giving a startled laugh. “Those are standard folk tales, meant to keep people from getting themselves killed on moonless nights and children from wandering off before they're ready. They're told to all outsiders, I'm sure.”

“I'm sure you're right, but these had... specifics that make me nervous.” Courfeyrac gives his head a shake, his dark hair flying. “Just be careful, Combeferre. These people are wary of outsiders, and even if the stories are just to keep us where they know what to make of us...”

“I'll be careful.” Combeferre finds his gaze drawn back to the darkening hills, though, to the way the sun touches the stone and makes it glimmer like starfire. “You know I always am.”

“I know you always _feel_ like you're being careful, but that didn't stop you and Joly from setting an awful lot of fires last year. Accidentally and very carefully.” Courfeyrac's hand touches his shoulder. “Come back in soon?”

Combeferre nods. “We'll get a chance to hear more stories soon. Don't think I'm going to miss the opportunity to record, or to ask questions.”

Courfeyrac sighs. “If you're not back in fifteen minutes, I'll send a rescue party bearing cold iron.”

Combeferre throws a withering look at his friend, but Courfeyrac has already slipped back towards the house where their little crew of researchers has been quartered. It's a nice house, two stories, well maintained. Combeferre is still trying to determine if its placement on the edge of town is meant as a warning (that they are not and never will understand this place), as a statement of fact (that they are outsiders), or is simply a matter of convenience, one of the few buildings in town besides the church that can house an additional six mouths.

When his eyes focus on the open space before him again, he finds himself startling. There was... something, out on the grass. Something swift and sleek and fast, too big to be a dog, too certain in its motion to be anything but a predator.

He leans out over the fence that separates their human property from the community land beyond. Was that a fox? But a fox should be smaller, and redder. Though with the waning light—

Motion catches his eye again, on the edge of his vision. Someone beckoning, he thinks, though there's no possible way a person could have appeared on that barren strip of land without passing through Combeferre's field of vision.

When he looks straight on, there's no one there, just a circular divot in the terrain, a dip which shimmers with reflected starlight. Not quite a pond, too grand to be a puddle; a trap for the unwary, but one that would likely only see them end up a bit wet.

Fingers seem to trail through his hair, and he jumps, spinning. There is no one by him, though. Just the wind, perhaps a moth. He tells his heart to be still, looking for any fluttering wings.

_Come._

The word isn't quite a word. It's a sighing of wind along his arm, raising gooseflesh there. It's a tug at his fingertips, the warmth of fire spreading along them with no reason or warning. It's a shimmering series of notes far out beyond the fence, telling him to follow.

He's half climbed over the fence before he realizes that's his intention. He pauses, glancing back towards the house, where windows are beginning to be lit.

He promised.

There's nothing there—there _can't_ be anything there—and he promised Courfeyrac he would be back in.

Reluctantly, feeling as though he's leaving something half-done, Combeferre backs his way towards the house.

“I'll see you later.” He whispers the words to the empty dark before he reaches out to take the doorknob. The cool metal against his fingertips helps him shake the last of the strangeness away, and he heads into the warmth and the light.

He is eager to hear the stories, after all; eager to see how they fit with others that have already been collected, eager to ask for them in the native dialect of this region, eager to listen and _learn_.

He cannot undo the damage that has been done to this place by people who neither knew nor cared about the locals, but he can be something new. He can be a scientist with morals, a researcher with _compassion_.

He hopes he will be able to do what others have not, and win back a modicum of trust—enough to at least help these people preserve further what they've managed to save so far.

It's enough to draw his thoughts deep into the house and away from whatever had beckoned outside, to keep him safe in the light for a little bit, at least.

***

“Ha!” Bahorel snorts, the bells on his antlers ringing as he tosses his head and stamps one foot. “We'll have that one before the week is o'er. He's as eager to come to us as ever a mortal man was. Then it's a matter of arranging the particulars so they leave rather than deciding there's something for them to stay and avenge.”

Jehan watches the door that the stranger disappeared through—the door that has iron built into it, a guarantee of protection from those that the locals know rightfully own these lands. “Did you taste his spirit?”

Bahorel snorts, pawing at the ground again. There is still more than a full turn of the moon before the Hunt will ride again, but it's close enough already that it makes him restless, reckless, _dangerous_.

Jehan likes his friends dangerous. It makes life more exciting.

“I tasted it.” Bahorel finally answers the question. “More to your liking than mine, I think.”

“Truly?” Jehan drifts back towards the fence—towards the line that indicates nothing real, just a human ideal of where the danger should start and safety begin. “Because I think there is the core of a warrior in him, though buried beneath... other sentiments.”

Buried beneath a compassion that Jehan has tasted rarely before, and never in someone foreign. The foreigners who have come here in the past have been haughty, angry people, determined to bend this land and all those within to their will.

Well... not all of them. Some of them have been people, just people, just _mortals_ , and they are either prey for the hunt or new recruits for the village.

This one could be like that. He could stay in the village, if he could be talked into giving it a chance. He would like it here, Jehan thinks. It is not the easiest land, not the simplest life, but the people are good, and the magic...

The magic still lasts here, where in so many other places it is gone.

A shoulder checks roughly but not unkindly against Jehan's. “Don't look that way.” Bahorel's words are low, full of understanding. “You know how this must go. There are few enough places we're safe now. We can't afford to let this place be endangered too.”

“Perhaps we could make it safer elsewhere again.” Jehan closes his eyes, opening himself to the wind, to the scents that it carries and the cool feel of it. “Spread out from this little prison we have crafted for ourselves.”

“We might yet.” Bahorel's antlers tinkle again, his whole body shivering with the force of his want. “I intend to see we do. But we won't manage that by deciding we like one of them. Not when we need to drive them off.”

Jehan reaches out, burying his hands in the warm fur that surrounds Bahorel's neck, resting his head against his friend's firm shoulder and drawing a deep breath of that wild scent into his lungs. “You know I have always been more drawn to the humans than you—more like them than you. And this one... did you hear how they talked?”

“I did, but I didn't understand it all.” Bahorel's shoulders move in a great shrug. “The language they use changes so quickly.”

“It does.” It has taken Jehan a long time to learn, and he doesn't think he will ever master it, the language changing completely in two hundred years whereas the fae have a tendency towards stasis. Chaos, but stasis; forever, but capable of being ended; changing, but only in recognized patterns.

It is who and what they are. Forces of the world made manifest, slivers of story come to life, thieves in the night and seducers in the day.

Endangered, as critically as so many other animals are these days, driven to the edges of human civilization by iron and electric lights and sheer furious numbers.

“What did he say?” Bahorel's chin nudges Jehan's face. “To interest you so.”

“That they are interested in the stories. Interested in the language. It felt... honest. Not like the ones who came before, the ones who tried to say it wasn't really a language.” Jehan shivers.

“We drove them off.” Bahorel nudges his head again, a comforting gesture from the wild hunter. “We will do so again.”

They had left a trail of bodies, none of them able to be traced back directly to the fae. Accident after accident, trick after trick, blood spill after blood spill, they drove the humans who did not belong to them from these rocky outposts, and there was so little of value left here that after enough deaths they didn't bother trying to come back.

Until now.

“Perhaps I will keep him.” Jehan turns the idea over in his head. As soon as the words have left his mouth he knows he wants to do this. It has been too long. To survive, to _thrive_ , they need humanity nearby; to survive, they need those humans to be on their side. They do not steal husbands and brothers and daughters and wives anymore. They do not take children to raise wild and reckless.

Not unless those children come to them.

Not when there are other places for sons and daughters and children to run to if they are not wanted, places that are less strange than the faelands that once were their refuge and their tomb.

“A body does more to scare and deter than a missing person.” Bahorel's eyes flash red, but Jehan isn't scared. He knows that his friend is a spirit of the hunt. With a soft tinkle of bells the red fades away, Bahorel's head tilting. “But if it pleases you to court him, I will not interfere. Just bid you to be careful.”

“I will be as careful as my nature allows.” Jehan leans in and places a soft kiss to Bahorel's cheek, knowing that he will understand.

They are both fae, after all. They are survivors and they are warriors and they are ancient beings tied deep to the land.

If such as they can't have sport and mischief every century or so, then what's the purpose of continuing to live?

***

The land is trying to claim him.

It's a ridiculous thing to think. It's utterly unscientific. It would get him laughed out of any academic circle he mentioned it in, told that he's spent too much time among the people he's interviewing, that he's going native.

Perhaps if seeing truth is going native then that's exactly what he's doing.

Courfeyrac sees what's happening, too. Combeferre knows that he sees it because Courfeyrac becomes clingy in a way the other man has never been before, trying desperately to keep Combeferre with him instead of letting Combeferre wander free to do their work the best way he knows how—out among the people, out in the land they're investigating.

It would irritate Combeferre if things weren't so... strange. If he didn't find himself ending up places he doesn't expect—places he shouldn't be _able_ to end up. When he leaves for ten minutes to check out the village square and somehow ends up forty minutes away, walking away from town, there's something very wrong.

And yet...

He doesn't feel threatened. He doesn't feel _endangered_ by what's happening. Just... desired. When he finds himself trailing along sheep paths, it's a warm hand on his elbow that's guiding him. When he finds himself out in the darkness, it's pleased laughter in his ear, not a threat. When he ends up walking from the room he and Courfeyrac share in the dead of night, the music that guides him is beautiful, and the steps he takes could be a dance.

Courfeyrac panics the first time this happens, tackling Combeferre to the ground and calling for assistance.

The second time it happens, when the moon is high in the sky and the cold has let up for a few hours at least...

“Combeferre.” Courfeyrac's voice and hand call Combeferre back from whatever trance had drawn him from his bed and towards the dark.

Combeferre blinks down at Courfeyrac, the hallway around him coming into focus. His chest aches, a sense of deep loss filling him for no reason at all.

Courfeyrac waits until Combeferre is clearly watching him before letting go. “You went to bed in your clothes.”

Combeferre opens his mouth, then looks down at himself and sighs. He did. Was he consciously aware of what he was doing? Of why?

“This is dangerous. Whatever it is...” Courfeyrac shivers. “The stories we heard, both before we came and while we've been here... you know this is dangerous, right? This is how people die.”

“We _don't_ know that, though.” Combeferre can hear the yearning spilling out into his voice. “We don't know anything. If this really is something like the stories, if this is something magical... we need to know that, don't we? We'd need to know that magic is real. That... that _they_ are real.”

He doesn't say what _they_ are. You don't name them, after all. You call them the Fair Folk, not because they are but because you _wish_ they were, wish their beauty were something that could just be admired without cutting.

“If you follow this song that only you can hear, will we actually know?” Courfeyrac's arms cross over his chest, Courfeyrac hugging himself tight. “If you just disappear, or if you turn up dead in a pond or at the bottom of some rise, will I know it was _them_ and not just... I don't know... altitude sickness?”

“I don't have altitude sickness. Both because we're not high enough and because we had me checked out by the doctor.” It had been the first thing Combeferre did when things started getting weird, trying to ensure that he wasn't just imagining everything.

“They're just _stories_.” Courfeyrac's hand suddenly lashes out, pounding against the wall. “We've been reading stories like these for years, hearing them for just as long. They're not real, though. There's nothing _real_ about this. Tell me that. Tell me this isn't real, that we're still proper scientists.”

“This isn't real. All I'll go do is have a look at the stars, and I'll be back before you miss me.” Combeferre speaks gently. “And when we're older, when we've published a hundred papers, we'll look back on this and laugh.”

“You're lying and we both know it.” Courfeyrac closes his eyes, drawing a deep breath, holding it before it can become a sob. “This is so stupid. I don't believe this is happening. And I don't... I don't know what I should do. Are you in your right mind right now? Do you really want to do this?”

“Do I ever not want to look into the shadows? Do I ever _not_ want to track down the primary source, or ask one more question of the person we're interviewing, or spend just one more hour collating our notes on a dying dialect?”

“One more hour?” Courfeyrac laughs, and if it's a shaky sound, it's still very _him_. “How many times have you pulled all nighters that you didn't need to?”

“I'm fairly certain you've told me every single one wasn't needed. Which coming from a man who's pulled all-nighters just to be social—”

“That's very different.” Courfeyrac reaches out, resting his hand on Combeferre's shoulder. “But I understand. This is _you_ , isn't it? This isn't a trance or a trick. This is you, willingly walking out into the night, looking to meet...”

“Yes.” Combeferre reaches up, putting his hand over Courfeyrac's. “If you'll allow it.”

“I don't know that it's my place to stop it.” Courfeyrac sighs. “But if you get spirited off to some fae dimension, you better leave me enough information for me to figure out what happened. Also to let me know if you need a rescue.”

“I promise I'll get you at least as many answers as I find myself.” Combeferre gives Courfeyrac's hand a gentle squeeze, stepping forward and away from his friend. “Also, I really don't have any intention of dying. Or disappearing. We really do have so many papers to write.”

“Damn right we do.” Courfeyrac releases Combeferre's hand, watching quietly as Combeferre walks to the front door.

Combeferre doesn't say anything else—certainly not goodbye. He doesn't wave.

He just walks, out of the artificial light and into the darkness.

He'll see Courfeyrac again. He just has to make sure he doesn't lose decades or his humanity or something else important before he does.

***

The man comes willingly.

Jehan hadn't expected that. Not when Combeferre has been fighting him so much. How long has it been since someone both wanted to come so badly and fought so hard to stay away? It's made for an interesting, fun game, especially with Jehan having to avoid anything rich in iron as he stalked his prey.

But now... when he could stay safe inside with his friends, with his false sunlight... the man comes willingly.

Jehan sings softly, leading him along the path he needs to follow. Out into the darkness, down and around past some of the rocky overhangs, along a path that is meant for four-legged creatures, and into the circle.

It's an old circle. If one doesn't know it's there, it's easy enough to miss. But the stones are all carved and arranged with care, though the grass has claimed most of them. This is a place of power, a place of passage, and Jehan's mortal walks into it with his head held high.

He pauses at the center of the circle, turning slowly. What can he see as he travels across to Jehan's realm? Do the stars seem different to him now—more real, more tangible? Does he taste the way the air changes, the way the stink of chemicals that has grown steadily over the last decades fades to nothing?

Does he like what he sees?

Jehan knows the moment Combeferre sees him. It's impossible to miss, Combeferre's eyes widening, his whole body freezing into a sharp line.

Then Combeferre does something Jehan hadn't expected. He lifts his hand, and he says, in the dialect of their local humans, “Hello, friend.”

Does he understand what it means to call a fae _friend_? Does he understand that in their mouths words are power, and to give them this kind of power is dangerous? Surely he must. He's been doing nothing but collecting words and the stories that explain them for the last week.

Jehan ghosts closer to the circle, standing just outside it. “Hello, human.”

“Combeferre.” The man swallows, eyes wide and bright, reflecting the moonlight in ways Jehan hadn't expected. Jehan can hear from the tremble in Combeferre's voice that he understands what it is that he's offering.

He doesn't offer the same in return. It would be too dangerous. “You come to me with eyes open.”

“I come to see what it is you've been teasing me with.” Combeferre chooses each word with care, showing again how well he's listened to the stories—how much he understands of the magic of this world.

“All I have used to tease you is the world in which you live. The world in which you walk.” Jehan moves closer to the mortal, reaching out to press long, pale fingers to his face.

Combeferre's breath stutters in his throat, but he continues to look into Jehan's face, continues to _study_ what he is seeing. “That's a good way to tease me, yes.”

Jehan feels a slow smile curling across his face. Oh, he _likes_ this mortal. “Come with me. Dance with me. See the truth of all those promises I whispered in your ear.”

“For one week at most.” Combeferre runs his tongue over his lips. “For one week, I will be yours, to see all the wonders you can show me. But then I have to go back. I have to see Courfeyrac again.”

Jehan frowns, pulling his hand away. “You seek to bargain with me?”

“That's what you do, isn't it?” Combeferre shifts nervously, one hand going to his pocket. If he has iron there, it's only a small amount—not enough to have kept him from crossing over the threshold. “You use words. You make bargains. In all the stories, that's how we mortals keep ourselves from being lost.”

“Are you so sure you don't wish to be lost?” Jehan leans closer, his breath mingling with Combeferre's. “Are you so sure you will wish to go back?”

“It doesn't matter.” Combeferre draws in a breath, and if his eyes unfocus as the warmth of Jehan's magic seeps into his lungs, it's only for a moment. “I give you one week, or I walk away now.”

“A week, then. A week and a choice.” Jehan turns the options over in his mind, but he knows by the time a week has passed he can have Combeferre lapping out of his hand. “At the end of one week we will return here, and I will let you choose—without interference—what it is you wish to do.”

“Agreed.” There's a spark to the air, a hint of lightning that hadn't been there before as Combeferre says the word.

Then he's stepping forward, no hesitation, no fear. Or... some fear, yes, he's too intelligent not to be afraid, but there is more eagerness, more _wonder_ than fear.

He holds out a hand.

Jehan places his hand in Combeferre's.

“You will not hurt any of us.” Bahorel's voice comes from behind them, startling Combeferre.

Jehan starts, too, though he should have sensed his friend's approach.

Bahorel is majestic, his antlers stark against the sky, his eyes blazing pits of red. The bells on his antlers glimmer like razor blades, their chimes a threat as much as the prelude to a dance. “Now or after a week, you will not hurt us. Or the Hunt will be wilder and more wondrous than it has been in centuries, I promise you that.”

Combeferre has stopped breathing, his eyes raking up and down Bahorel's form, and now the fear is stronger. Now he sees that what he is walking into is something far vaster than he has known before, even if it is diminished. “I...”

Jehan lifts Combeferre's hand to his mouth, kissing the back of the slim fingers.

Combeferre turns from Jehan to Bahorel, and his shoulders straighten. “I will not bring harm to you or yours save in defense of myself or those who are in my care. Will that suffice?”

Bahorel bares his teeth, and they are a wolf's teeth, sharp and glistening. “For now.”

With a toss of his head, Bahorel vanishes, leaving only the lingering echo of jingling bells behind him.

“Come.” Jehan tugs gently on Combeferre's hand. “I have so much to show you, and a week is not such a long time.”

***

A week is a long time.

A week is no time at all.

It's the type of contradiction that the fae are used to—the type of contradiction they love and thrive on. Jehan is fully prepared to make the most of his week, to woo and tempt and trap his mortal.

What he isn't prepared for is how very much he _likes_ Combeferre.

He shouldn't. Combeferre is a scientist through to his core. He claims it as his job title, as his calling, as his crusade. He dresses it in frillier words—loves to use terms like _linguist_ and _lore—_ but he is a man who _studies_ things. He wants to _learn_ , to _know_ , to explore the depths of something and make it comprehensible.

But Combeferre also knows how to dance. He knows how to give himself over to the magic, how to listen and follow Jehan's lead and see the truth in both the fae sky and mortal one.

He doesn't break under the contradictions that are fae existence. He doesn't back away from Jehan saying that things such as him cannot exist; doesn't flinch from Bahorel and say that the wild Hunt is long over.

He does keep Jehan between himself and Bahorel on those occasions when Bahorel dogs their steps, but that's simply survival instinct, and Jehan is glad to see he has it.

Just as glad as he is to see Combeferre smiling as Jehan dances him across a meadow that no longer exists in the mortal world, through flowers that have gone to seed. Combeferre cries out in delight when he sees a moth fluttering from one flower to another, and his hand pulls itself free of Jehan's.

Jehan allows him to go to his pretty flying bug. He allows so many things that he shouldn't if he intends to make this man a sacrifice.

“Do you know what this is?” Combeferre stands, the large moth cupped in his hands, white wings with beautiful black spatters fanning slowly. “These haven't been seen in ages, despite people trying desperately to find them. Though I don't know that this was ever their habitat, I thought—”

“Everything that once lived has at least an echo here.” Jehan reaches out, brushing hair away from Combeferre's face. He doesn't want to talk about the way there are more echoes every year, more denizens of these wilds who cannot cross the border.

Combeferre must see something of that on his face. He releases the moth, watching it fly off for a few moments, before holding out his hands. “Is our dance done?”

“No.” Jehan slides his body against Combeferre's, his fingers lacing through the mortal man's. “Once you choose to dance with a fae, you're never done.”

“There is a part of me that would not regret that.” Combeferre whispers the words in Jehan's ear. “There is a part of me that would let you sing to me, let you spin me about the dance floor, let you weave me tales until I died of starvation or exhaustion or old age, whichever this land decided to allow.”

“I know.” Jehan presses his nose to the side of Combeferre's neck, inhaling the sweet, intoxicating scent of his mortality.

“But there is a part of me that wouldn't allow it, too.” Combeferre spins out when Jehan indicates he should, showing no hesitation at being the following partner. “I bargained for my return.”

“I remember.” This, too, is a part of what makes Combeferre so enticing. The ones who are smart enough, loved enough, _connected_ enough to make bargains for their return are often like that. They are the ones about whom the great stories are made.

Not that the ones who come unloved and abandoned do not live great tales of their own. Theirs are fae tales, though, meant for fae ears. They are not the ones that Combeferre embodies.

Jehan pulls Combeferre back tight to his body, moving them together, the stars and the wind their only orchestra.

“It hasn't...” Combeferre's voice falters. “A week hasn't gone by?”

“Here or there?” Jehan cannot keep the teasing from his voice.

Combeferre goes dead still, his voice losing the ruddy blush of exercise and excitement. “What... you mean...”

“You crossed a threshold and you did not specify which time was to be used.” Jehan reaches out to brush hair from Combeferre's face again.

Combeferre flinches back, the first time he has done so. “Time flows differently here?”

“The seasons are the same. We _are_ the seasons, in some ways. But a day, a week... those are such mortal concepts. Here we are the cold, the light, the thaw, the moon.”

“But you agreed to it. One week. And if one week means little here and a distinct thing there, then you must follow one week from a mortal reckoning.” Combeferre's shoulders relax, the color returning to his face.

“I _must_ hold to the letter of my word. If I wanted to be cruel, that could be a very difficult thing for you to maneuver around.” Jehan reaches up, laying both hands on Combeferre's cheeks. “I find myself not wanting to be cruel right now, though it has been overly long since I had opportunity for either kindness or cruelty to be a thing that matters.”

“Your friend wears his anger like a badge of honor, a wound that no one can hurt him with if he shares it openly.” Combeferre presses closer to Jehan, his voice soft. “But you... I think you could be angered, but sorrow is more your purview, isn't it?”

“Anger and sorrow are both valid responses to what has happened to us. To what has happened to our world, and the world of those who still respect us.” Jehan presses his lips gently to Combeferre's, tasting his breath. “Your science has not been very kind to those of us who are the land.”

“Not my science. My _people_.” Combeferre looks slightly stunned, his eyes wide, his breath quick. His hands grip Jehan's hips, though he doesn't move in to kiss him again. “Science is a tool; what matters is the wielder. We are trying to fix what we can, to undo some of the damage that has been done.”

“I know.” Jehan kisses him again, deeper this time, more possessive. “You are the first lover of science I have had. The first who did not use science as a tool to dismiss all of the world they could not control.”

“Then you have met very poor scientists.” Combeferre's breath is quick and fast, fogging the air around them. “Before more, though, please... you'll bring me to the crossing when a week has passed?”

“I will bring you to the crossing when a week has passed in the mortal world.” Jehan makes the promise as he nibbles gently on Combeferre's ear.

It's all Jehan has to do, and Combeferre gives himself once more willingly to Jehan's ministrations and explorations.

He will not want to let him go when a week has passed.

But he will hold to his word, and see what choices Combeferre makes, what speaks loudest to his open, welcoming heart.

***

Combeferre stands before the circle of stones and knows the choice he has to make.

He promised Courfeyrac. He cannot go back on his word, not if he wants to stand among these fae creatures and learn to understand them better.

They are so beautiful. They aren't human, and the rules they work by aren't the rules of physics as Combeferre knows them, but they are rules nonetheless. He could spend years here working out the particulars, figuring out why sometimes one effect arises from the motions of the fae and sometimes another.

But to have those years, to remain _himself_ , he has to walk through.

The dangerous one is standing by his guide again, though the aura of threat around him is... different now. More wary, grudging confusion than outright attempts to terrorize.

And his guide... oh, his guide is absolutely beautiful, standing forlorn in the three inches of snow that fell overnight.

“Go, then.” His guide gestures to the circle. “You had your week, and I am feeling generous. Go back to your life.”

“And if I want to come back?” Combeferre should have asked this earlier, but he was afraid to lessen his chances of getting to return in the first place.

It's the antlered fae who speaks. “This isn't a place for mortals to dally and dance at their contentment before returning to their normal lives.”

“I promise you, my life will not be normal.” Combeferre chokes on a laugh, not quite allowing it voice. How could his life be normal after this? After sleeping wrapped in a cloak of flowers while extinct creatures gamboled around him and his fae lover played the most glorious music on a flute that seemed carved from someone's femur?

“Jehan.”

The name—because that's all it ever could be—drops between the three of them like a challenge.

The antlered fae rocks back as though struck, and the sounds the bells in his antlers make as he shakes his head are more akin to swords being sharpened than any bit of music.

“My name is Jehan.” Jehan steps forward, giving Bahorel a quelling look before turning to Combeferre. “You gave me a week. May I do the same?”

Combeferre simply stares. “I...”

“You would have to keep me from cold iron—its touch is anathema. And I would ask you to use a different name for me. And I will be weaker, dancing on your side of the stones. But if you would allow it...”

The antlered one begins prowling in a tight circle around them, but Combeferre doesn't allow his gaze to stray from Jehan. “I would be honored.”

“After that week...” Jehan glances at his friend. “We used to travel there more, and to have mortals travel here.”

“It was safer for us, then.” The antlered fae's voice is a low growl. “You cannot trust that you will be allowed to return.”

Jehan's eyes find his friend. “The Hunt rides soon. Any foolish enough to try to keep me from you at the Hunt deserves what befalls them.”

The hunter snorts out a breath, but his shoulders ease somewhat.

“A week together.” Jehan steps closer, holding out a hand. “After that... we will talk, and see what it is that we can come to agreement on.”

Combeferre's fingers close over Jehan's, drawing him forward, to the very edge of the circle. “A week. I give my word.”

Then they walk, together, through the stones.

It's night on both sides of the circle. Combeferre is glad of that, as he is glad of the electric light that shines in the distance, calling him back home.

Courfeyrac is leaning on the fence, his expression drawn, his eyes fixed out on the empty grass. Combeferre knows the moment he sees him, because Courfeyrac's slumped shoulders lift, and then he's vaulting over the fence and running towards them.

Combeferre increases his pace, and Jehan keeps up with him, their hands never separating.

Courfeyrac practically tackles him to the ground, grabbing him in the biggest hug imaginable. “Combeferre, you _ridiculous_ man, I thought you were _gone_ , I thought—”

“I'm fine.” It's true, too. He is _changed_ , but in a way that makes him feel more whole than he had been before, not less. “Let me introduce you to a friend.”

Courfeyrac finally seems to become aware that there is someone else there. He turns, eyeing Jehan warily.

“This is my... friend...” A true enough word, though hardly the whole of the truth. “Jean. Jean, this is my dear friend Courfeyrac.”

“The one who's been worried about Combeferre since he willingly went to the—” Courfeyrac stops, his eyes widening.

“There's a lot for us to talk about.” Combeferre squeezes Courfeyrac's shoulder. “But first, let's share a drink together.”

To his credit, Courfeyrac doesn't hesitate for more than a second. His usual smile returns, and he gestures for Combeferre and Jehan to follow him to the house.

They have a week—a week to see how Jehan fares in this world that once rejected him. A week to see what feels safe and what feels dangerous, to see where magic can fit into science, and science can fit into magic. Combeferre has never loved a theory so much as he loves the realities that unfold when one truly _sees_ the world, after all.

And then... then they will have more time, hopefully, because merging worlds will surely take a great deal of it.


End file.
